Rewind
by K Hanna Korossy
Summary: Clip Show tag: Struggling with Sarah Blake's death and Crowley's ultimatum, the Winchesters receive help from a very unlikely source.


**Rewind**  
K Hanna Korossy

They usually lived on too little sleep, grabbing shut-eye when they could. And Sam was already kind of a mess from the Trials anyway, needing a lot more rest than normal and still constantly looking exhausted. But the way he crashed as soon as they got in the car, that was avoidance. Trying to sleep through a grief he couldn't face just then.

And, yeah, Dean got it. It'd been both pain and pleasure for him to see Sarah Blake again, too, reminder of one of the big what-ifs of Sam's life, so he could just imagine what a punch it had been for Sam. He'd seen his little brother's flush at her belief in them, at her observation that Sam had grown up, the realization she was married and had a kid. He'd kept in touch with her for a couple years after the case that crossed their paths, probably losing the connection when Dean died, when Sam had lost everything else. She'd meant a lot to him, and not just in a hot-girl-into-me kind of way.

And then the last second counted down, and Sammy had watched her die, suffocate over long seconds while they tried and failed to save her.

After a few seconds of shocked silence staring at her body and the elusive hex bag, Sam had bolted back to life. Yelled at Dean to burn the bag—oh, yeah, duh—and started CPR. He should've thought of that himself, but they were both reeling, Dean's mind dizzy with _please, oh, God, please_ as he watched Sammy try to bring her back. He hadn't wished this hard since it'd been Sam lying on the floor…one of the times.

But she was gone. He'd had to pry his kid brother off her body, brushing his tears away with the flat of his hand, shaking Sam until he met Dean's eyes. It was Madison the werewolf all over again, but Sam had only known Madison a few days. This was history and friendship and hope curling up and dying in Sam's eyes.

Dean had cleaned the place up as best he could, wiped their prints off—more shades of Madison—then led his stumbling, dazed brother out of there, into the car for the eleven-hour trip back home. And Sam had promptly slept ten-and-a-half of those hours.

He was also feverish, Dean found with a sweep of a flushed cheek. No surprise these Trial days, but still unwelcome news. He'd stopped at some chain pharmacy that was still open in the middle of the night, roused Sam enough to swallow pills and most of a water bottle, avoided the leaden look in his eyes, then tucked him in before turning the radio on to lull him back to sleep.

Sam was fading. If they didn't do the last Trial soon, he might not even be able to finish it. Cas was in the wind, and Dean didn't trust him farther than he could spit at him, anyway. The idiot thought he was doing the right thing—again—and that had never gone well before. Abaddon was also on the loose thanks to their stupidity, Metatron's warnings about completing the Trials played on loop in Dean's thoughts, and Naomi and Crowley were unpredictable players on the game board. Pretty much all they had going for them right now was that they had a place to go home to.

He did let himself utter a sigh of relief as the bunker came into sight. At least there was that. And Sam was still next to him, even if he was radiating enough heat to make _Dean_ want to take his jacket off, and he was coughing up blood even in his sleep, and his heart was broken yet again. And there wasn't a single thing Dean could do about any of those things.

The Impala's engine dying wasn't enough to rouse Sam as it usually was. Dean shook his shoulder more gently than he would have another time, watched Sam's glazed eyes register confusion, relief, then memory and anguish. Dean didn't say a word, just tightened his grip a second before sliding out to let Sam gather himself. He got both their bags and had the car locked up before his brother even opened his door.

He'd waited until they were inside before asking Sam if he was okay—wasn't like he didn't already know the answer—and offered that they should stick to the plan. Sam was waffling, weary and just about done, leaning toward taking Crowley's deal. Dean argued back: they'd find a way to stop the bastard, but they were so close to something much, much bigger. He appealed to Sam's desire to save lives, pointing out how many they could save by closing Hell. Didn't mention that at this point, Sam's life was the only one he truly cared about, and the third Trial had to be completed to stop his decline.

Sam finally caved, trusting him. Shoulders rounded with grief and illness, eyes full and silently begging Dean to make this work. Dean took the weight, gladly, and had rarely felt so proud of his kid brother.

Then came Crowley's call—it was twelve hours already?—and the promise that a "dear friend's" life was on the line. Garth? Jody? Lisa? Didn't really matter: his eyes locked on Sam's, Dean agreed, saw his brother's reluctant nod. They had four hours to come up with a plan before they met Crowley.

Sam sank down at the war room table like his legs couldn't hold him anymore. They probably couldn't.

Dean sat across from him so they were at eye-level. "Okay. Okay. So, we've just gotta stop him." He hoped he didn't sound like he was desperately grasping for straws, even though he was. "Not like we haven't done that a hundred times before with different black-eyes."

"Red-eyes," Sam corrected, each word sounding like an effort. "Crowley's still a crossroads demon, even if he's moved up to management."

"Right. Well…same difference, right? We've got the knife, angel swords, Kevin's demon grenades—something's gotta work even on the King of Hell."

Sam paused. Then his eyes narrowed. "Or…we catch him instead of kill him."

It only took Dean a few seconds to cotton on because he was so freaking tired, too. He straightened in his seat. "A demon to cure."

Sam's smile was more a twitch of the mouth. "Wanna bet there's something in our new dungeon that'll lock him down?"

Dean was beginning to smile, too. "Oh, yeah."

Sam's hand was trembling on the tabletop, and he slid it out of sight into his lap. His face aged again. "We should, uh, call someone. About Sarah. Her husband—"

"I'll call Indianapolis PD," Dean said gently. "They'll tell—"

His cell phone rang.

They both tensed. Sam's eyes were sharper now, even as they burned with fever. He watched intently as Dean pulled out his phone. And frowned at the screen.

"Who is it?"

"It says…" He could feel the puzzlement on his face. "'No one you want to mess with'?"

Sam blinked.

Dean pushed _Accept_ and lifted it cautiously to his ear. "Hello?"

" _Did you kill Jenny? Jenny Klein?"_

He gaped a second. "What? No! Who is this?"

There was a moment's pause, then, a little less aggressively, _"Don Stark."_

Stark, Stark. Tony? No, that was— Don! The witch, the one married to the other witch, the ones with the serious marital issues. And the assistant whom the Winchesters had just the day before found incinerated in her oven. "Don. Yeah, no, we were there, but she was already gone by then. Sorry," Dean added belatedly.

He saw Sam trying to follow the one-sided conversation, and the bloom of realization when he figured out who Dean was talking to and why.

He could hear Stark exhale. _"Yeah, I sensed you two there, but I felt the magic, too. Real magic, not like you two bozos tried to do."_

He was too tired to take offense. "I'm really sorry, man, but Jenny was a bargaining chip, trying to force our hand on something. We didn't know until it was too late."

Sam's eyes dropped. His whole arm was trembling now, and maybe glowing a little bit? He tucked it under the table.

" _Who?"_ Don asked coldly.

"Listen, we're takin' him down in a couple of hours—he's not gonna get away with it, okay? He killed two other people trying to get to us…"  
Sam had clamped down on his lip so hard that it was bleeding. Dean reached over and tugged on his chin until he let go with a gasp.

" _That's not good enough, Winchester. I want his head on—"_

It was Dean's turn for flat finality. "Nothing you do is gonna beat what we've got in store for him, believe me."

Another pause. _"Who were the other two?"_

The question threw him, and he automatically sought Sam's eyes with the question: _tell him?_ But Sam was just staring at the table, mind seven hundred miles away. He couldn't hear Don, anyway.

Dean cleared his throat. "Guy named Tommy Collins in Colorado, and…Sarah Blake,"—he watched Sam's head snap up—"in a motel in Indianapolis." Sam's head tilted, nose flaring like he was trying to hold back tears, or rage, and questions. Dean swallowed. "Why?"

Stark snorted. _"No witch marks my territory and gets away with it. Whatever he's got in mind, he's not gonna get—I'll undo what he did, and you make sure he doesn't do it again, got it?"_

"Wait," Dean stammered. "By undo, you mean…"

Another snort, this one more amused. _"Seriously? You think folding back time and reversing a couple of deaths is hard? Hey, five-hundred-year-old witch here."_ There was a noise in the background. _"Two witches,"_ Don quickly corrected. _"And Jenny was the best assistant I've had in, like, a century."_ Another squawk. _"Only an assistant, darling,"_ he added, which Dean assumed wasn't meant for him.

Dean met his brother's gaze over the map table, daring to let his brother see his hope. Could it be…? It was true that Stark had stopped a Leviathan back then like it was nothing, when nothing else they'd found up to then could even faze them. "Dude, remind me not to mess with you two. Again."

" _Just take care of your end, hunter,"_ Stark said tersely, and hung up.

Dean pulled the phone away from his ear, stared at it a moment, then at his brother. "You are not gonna believe this. I…I think…" He told Sam haltingly, afraid of raising unreasonable hope, not really relieved when his brother sat up straighter, new light in his eyes.

Minutes later, Sam's phone rang.

He gasped like he'd been holding his breath, the first sound he'd made since Stark's call, and stared at Dean wildly. His hands were shaking again as he pulled his cell out, but Dean was pretty sure it wasn't from fever or weakness this time. Sam stared at it a moment, then thumbed it on and held it tentatively to his ear. "S-Sarah?"

Dean watched him a long moment, until his brother's first tear broke. Taking a deep breath of his own, he got up to go make sandwiches.

When he returned, Sam was still sitting in the same seat, phone limp in his lap, his face wet. His eyes were raw when he looked up at Dean, and for a second he feared it wasn't what he'd hoped.

"She…" Sam's voice cracked, and he shook his head. "She doesn't blame me. She _thanked_ us. Sarah…she's going back home to her-her husband and," he dragged in air, "her kid." Sam's eyes searched his face. "She's okay, man, she's _alive."_

Dean set the plates down on the table and gripped his brother's shoulder, the same way he had in the car. Sam was still overheated, still shaky, still declining. But there was a new strength in his frame, fresh determination. Hope.

Sam dragged in a breath. "All right. We're doing this."

Dean smiled at the kid he believed in like nothing else. "Let's go."

 **The End**

 _And...that's all she wrote, literally, for now. I've been busy with a different project this summer, but I hope to get back to S8 and 9 shortly and have some new stuff by hiatus. Hope you enjoyed the summer reading, and onward to S12! -KHK_


End file.
